Love Never Dies
by thegigglemaster
Summary: Loosely based off of "Love Never Dies" musical. Well known Bounty hunter Emma with husband Neal and their son Henry have been requested to come to storybrooke, Maine by a mysterious 'Mr. H' to find someone. Mr. H (aka Killian)begs Emma to run away with him,even after he abandoned her ten years ago. They make a deal, and will Emma be able to live with the consequences?Charactr Death
1. Chapter 1

LOVE NEVER DIES

BY M.A. COLLIER

_A/N: Hey guys! Sorry it's been a while for my writing. I've had a lot going on in my life right now. My Grandfather had two strokes in the course of a week right before I had finals and it just seems like every time things settle down, life throws me another curve in the road. My muse has been really silent under these stressful times, but I'm on vacation for the fourth, so I'm hoping that I can catch up on some writing while I have time to semi-relax. All that to say if you don't hear from me for a while, I'm not doing it intentionally, I just have a lot on my plate what with work, my grandfather, getting ready for next semester, and other family drama. I'm really sorry that my writing is what gets put on the back burner during these times, but that's how my brain likes to work. Hopefully as shooting starts back up, too, my muse will come back to me. _

_So this is A/U and based on the "Phantom of the Opera"/"Love never dies" storylines with a twist. I hope you enjoy it!_

It had been ten years. Ten _fucking_ long years since she'd seen him. And now, he wanted to just waltz back into her life as if she could drop everything and run away with him, like they had planned all those years ago. _As if,_ Emma thought angrily. She had a life now. True, it was the life that she had envisioned them having, but still it was a life. She was married, and to a good guy. She had a son. She had a job. She had the all American dream. And now here he was, trying to whisk her away. But it was too late. And, dammit, she wished it wasn't.

Once upon a time she had loved him.

Once upon a time, she had been terrified to admit it.

Once upon a time, they'd had a chance.

Once upon a time…

Those few words echoed inside her head as she paced the floor of her hotel room. How had he found them? True, he was resourceful, he always had been. It was a requirement for his job, she supposed. But still, ten years without any contact whatsoever, not even a post card…She knew she had purposefully made it difficult to find them, but when he wanted something, he never did know when to give up.

Just then she heard the door to their balcony slide open with a _whoosh_. She spun around, already knowing who would be there when she did, but still surprised when she saw him, standing right in the middle of the living area in their hotel suite, half drenched from the storm that was raging outside.

"Killian," she whispered in greeting.

He slid the door shut swiftly before rushing across the space that lay between them and claiming her lips with his in a hungry, all-consuming kiss. It was a kiss of passion, of desperation, the kiss of a man who had been in a desert for many years and Emma was his water. He broke their kiss ever so slightly and rested his forehead against hers.

"Have you made a decision yet, love?" he breathed against her mouth.

Emma closed her eyes and kissed him again, gently this time, gingerly even, and didn't say anything.

"Emma…" He breathed. He knew what she was telling her, he had always been able to read her mind, to tell what she was thinking just but observing her body language. She was telling him she wanted to, but she couldn't.

"Killian, I have a son to think about now. I can't just leave him, and I can't take him away from his father without an explanation. Besides, how can I be sure that you won't just disappear on me again when things get a little difficult?"

"You know I never would have left you if I hadn't thought that it would be safer for you to stay and marry that baboon, Neal. Had I not thought it would make you happier in the end because he was what you wanted and not me?" He argued. "I only ever wanted what was best for you, Emma. I was a criminal, I was on the run. By bringing you with me, I ran the risk of you getting hurt, and more than emotionally."

Emma could feel the sting of tears start to build up in her eyes as memories of the past ten years flashed before her. The hurt and heartache she had experienced after he had left her in the middle of the night, leaving her to wake up alone and cold in his bed. She had planned on telling him that she loved him that morning, she would follow him to the ends of the earth, but instead she was left with her curses falling into the empty air. She had left his hide out and went to prepare for her wedding to Neal that was supposed to happen in two weeks, shame and anger filling her heart.

"Emma, look at me," Killian pleaded, breaking her out of her memories and gently pulling her face back towards his. "I love you. I always have and always will. But you chose him over me once before, how could I have been sure that you wouldn't chose him again after our one night of passion?"

"Because I fucking wanted YOU, Killian!" Emma screamed. "I found YOU that night, I stayed with YOU. I know I made a mistake when I accepted Neal's proposal, but I didn't know how I felt then. I thought that you were dangerous, that you had killed all of those people just because you could, not because they were after you. Neal was my first love, he was steady, dependable, and I had to at least give him a shot. But he was never the one I truly wanted. He never could give me what I needed."

"That's why you should come with me! You know he will never make you truly happy. Run away with me, Emma, run away to a place that we can always be happy and never have to worry about Neal or the police or anything and it can be just us and we can live the life we always wanted."

His voice had taken on an intoxicating tone as he whispered these promises into her ear. She wanted so badly to leave with him, but what about Henry? What would she tell him?

"I'll tell you what, Emma," Killian had begun to use his tone for bargaining. "I'll make a deal with you. If you can resist me for the rest of this week, I will let you, your husband, and your son leave here and you will never hear from me again. But, if I can seduce you before the period of your job is up, then you stay here, with or without your son, it's your choice, and Neal must leave forever."

Emma thought about this, hard. She wasn't sure she would be able to resist sleeping with him, not if just seeing him sent her into a horny frenzy. But if she couldn't resist him, didn't that show that her marriage was a sham and she might as well leave the man she didn't love and couldn't be faithful to?

"Deal," she said before she could help herself. _Shit_, she thought to herself, _Emma, what have you gotten yourself into?_

"Let's seal it with a kiss," Killian leaned into her and gave her one more of his dizzying kisses that made him that much harder to resist. The deal was struck. She had a week to make a life changing decision.

"Mom?" She heard a quiet voice inquire from around the corner.

"Come here, Henry, what's the matter?" She said lovingly.

Killian watched as a boy of no more than 10 emerged from the hallway where their rooms were located. He had curly blonde hair and was of slender stature, yet fairly tall for his age. He seemed like an average boy, the type of son he would have expected Emma and Neal to have. What caught him off guard, however, where his eyes. The child had a pair of blue/green eyes, the kind of shade of the ocean, and his eyes were framed with thick, black eyelashes that gave the appearance of him wearing eyeliner. There was no doubt in his mind, after he saw his eyes. There was no Neal in this child.

He had Killian's eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

He was _furious. _How could she do this to him? How could she keep something like this from him? Didn't he mean anything at all to her?

Neal stormed onto the ship and stomped towards where Emma was standing with her old friend, Ruby.

"Mr. Cassady!" He could hear Granny call after him. "Wait!"

He couldn't believe it. He had thought the damn pirate was dead. He should have known better.

"Neal! Babe, can you believe it, Ruby and I just ran into each other after all these years! She's working for Mr. H regularly as a part of the theme park." He could vaguely register the nonchalant words that Emma was speaking as she tried to ignore his obvious rage.

He angrily grabbed Emma's arm.

"Neal," she said innocently enough, but the warning in her eyes was clear. "What's wrong?"

"What's wrong?!" He scoffed. "Oh I think you know, Emma. Oh, yes, you know perfectly well…"

Emma's face was one of pure bewilderment. "I don't know what you mean…"

"Save me the fake ignorance," he hissed. "You had to know that _he_ was the one who gave you this job."

"What do you mean, _he_?"

During this discussion, Granny had caught up with them and had gone to Ruby's side.

"Did you know that he had asked her to come here?" whispered Granny into Ruby's ear.

"No, you?"

"Of course not! I can't believe he would betray us like that. After all we've done for him, helping him get to safety and housing him…"

"Granny, could you please enlighten my wife as to whom her employer really is?" Neal interjected.

Everyone stood silent for a moment, no one daring to say anything at all.

Finally, Emma broke the silence. "Where's Henry?" She observed slightly panicked.

"Oh, for the love of God, could you please teach that boy to stay in place for _one moment_?" Neal complained after looking all around for the boy. "Do we _always_ have to be searching for him?"

"I'll look for him, Neal. You just go do…whatever it is that you want." Emma proposed.

"What I _want_ is for us to leave this Godforsaken town and go home to Tallahassee."

"Not gonna happen," Emma stated. "We need the money, remember?" She hissed.

"Fine." Neal stated flatly. "Find the boy. I'm going back to the hotel."

Neal stormed off, probably to a bar or a poker game, Emma knew. He had lied when he said he was going to the hotel. He lied almost every day when he said he would be home before 4 am. He lied when he told people they still had his family money. He lied when he said that they weren't chest high in debt. He lied when he said he wasn't a drunk. He lied when he said he loved their son.

Emma pushed the thoughts from her head as she focused on finding her son. Henry did so love to explore and go on adventures. She was sure she would find him climbing something he wasn't supposed to. Ruby said that she would help find him if she could. Emma graciously accepted.

* * *

Henry had been looking at the souvenir shop's toy swords when one of the employees, Leroy maybe, had come up to him and said that Mr. H wanted to see him in his private study so that he could give him a private tour of his pirate theme park. Henry had excitedly followed him.

As he descended below deck to the captain's quarters, he suddenly felt nervous about going into the captain's cabin.

"Does my mom know where I'm going? I don't want for her to worry…"

"Ah, kid, relax, she'll know where you are," Leroy replied gruffly.

"Oh…Okay," Henry said meekly. He tripped slightly as he followed the bear of a man through the dark underbelly of the "ship". Mr. H's theme park was entirely based off of fairytales, but with a twist and the main attraction was the pirate show that occurred every night at 8 o'clock on the _Jolly Roger, _which also housed all administrative offices. All of the fable-based rides told a much darker story than the one's he had been told to help him go to sleep. In the distorted versions that Mr. H had based his rides on, Red Riding Hood was the wolf, Prince Charming was originally the the poor shepherd twin to awful Prince James, Jack, from Jack and the beanstalk, was a ruthless female mercenary, and Snow White was an awesome bandit and hunter. He preferred these stories to the originals any day. They made so much more sense to him.

Suddenly, Leroy had stopped and opened the door to the captain's cabin for Henry. He could had only registered this fact when he was shoved into the room and the door was quickly shut after him. Henry stood there in the entryway petrified of what he had just stepped into. The entire room was dark, even though it was not quite mid-day outside. Only a few melting candles gave illumination to the objects in the room. Still, the boy could tell that he was not alone in the room. A shadowed figure loomed by the windows, which were covered in black curtains as if the man was purposefully trying to make the room as dark as possible. _Or maybe he's trying to keep something out…_

"Henry, m' lad, come in!" Welcomed a familiar Irish voice. It was Mr. H himself. Henry expelled a small sigh of relief. If his mom could trust Mr. H, so could he.

The man approached Henry and extended his hand for a greeting shake, which Henry returned politely.

"How are you, lad? Hope Leroy didn't frighten you too much. I know he can be quite gruff at times, but he's still the best and most loyal member of me crew. Now, why don't I open the curtains a bit so that we can actually see one another, aye? I tend to like it dark for business transactions, makes the other men nervous and allows me to get whatever I want, ha, but I dare say we should let some light for this occasion…"

Mr. H was rambling. Henry knew this because he did the same thing when he was nervous. But why Mr. H was nervous, he couldn't quite figure out…

It was only later that he realized something was weird with Mr. H.

It was only later, after they had realized how many similarities they shared, that he thought something wasn't quite right with what was occurring between the two males.

It was only later that he was able to reflect that he had felt more of a paternal bond with Mr. H within minutes than he had ever felt with his real father his entire life.

It was only after he had seen the hook had he realized why Mr. H always wore dark clothing that covered his hands.

It was only after he had screamed that he realized there was more Mr. H in him than Neal.

It was too late after he screamed.

It was too late after he fainted.

It was too late to undo the hurt that had been inflicted upon Killian by that scream.

It was too late for Emma to protect either of them anymore.


End file.
